The next generation of managers include Generation Y (Millennial) and Generation Z (post-Millennial). Gen Y are people born in 1980 – 1995 and Gen Z –1995-2010 (Williams, 2015). First people from the next generation of managers started working in a suitable role roughly in 2000s, i.e. the society can be divided into two parts: 20th century society and the next society.
The next society
The world had changed much in 2000s as new generation, new approaches and new vision came into the force. It was about the change in the society rather in economics. In the developed countries, the dominant factor was growth in older population and shrink of younger generation as the birth rate had decreased. This led the mass market to become more middle-age-determined than young-determined. New employment patterns were created because it is important to attract growing age population.
The next society is knowledge society. The knowledge workers are dominant workforce comparing to 20th century society where dominant workforce was unskilled manual workers who gained experience through apprenticeships. The knowledge society is highly competitive one as informative technologies make knowledge accessible to everyone. The knowledge society member cannot get into the job through apprenticeship as it requires formal education for being suitable for the role.
In 20th century multinational companies were domestic firms with subsidiaries abroad. Each of them was self-contained, in charge of their defined territory and highly autonomous. Now multinationals are being organized globally across product and service lines. Also, another difference is that in 20th century multinational companies were controlled by ownership and now by strategy. The type of top management changed too. Before in the most large and complex companies top management was seen as an extension of operating management. Today top management has more tasks to accomplish, for example, to balance the conflicting demands on business being made by the need for both short-term and long-term results, and by the corporation's various constituencies: customers, shareholders, etc. (Drucker, 2001).
The generation gap
It has to be mentioned that Generations Y and Z have many similarities as both of them were born in the midst of technological era. Both generations connect their work with social impact and are ready to use creative tools to make change (Scott, 2016). So, Generations Y and Z will be seen as “next generation”. The differences will be discussed in next paragraph.
Picture 1 (Economist, 2013)
The generation gap is an issue today as difference in approach towards different age group is massive. Another problem is in perception and understanding each other among different age groups. Baby-boomers (1946 – mid-1960s) are not very happy with volunteering or usage of technologies, when Generation X and next generation are concerned with social impact which is connected to their job. The social network among employees is one of the core needs for next generation as it increases efficiency of the work. Younger generation want to work in company that offers challenging work, sense of purpose and development. Baby-boomers and Generation X will definitely find mentoring rewarding as next generation constantly seeks feedback (Economist, 2013).
Characteristics of the next generation of managers
The next generation are quick learners and are promoted into management roles faster than other generations. For example, the Ernst and Young survey found out that 87% of next generation managers took formal leadership role in the last five years, comparing to 38% and 19% of Generation X and Baby-Boomers accordingly. They are seen as the best inclusive leaders who effectively inspire diverse group of people. That skill is highly relevant in the near future (Edmonds, 2013).
Picture 2 (Williams, 2015)
There are many shared similarities between Generations Y and Z. However, there are key distinctions too. They will be discussed below.
Key distinctions between Gen Y and Z
Technology – post-Millennial do not know the world without smartphones and social network. It can be stated that they are more integrated into digital age than Millennials. The quick search and access to any information in an eye blink is another distinction of Gen Z. Millennials need some time to accomplish the same tasks.
Privacy – Gen Z is more concerned about privacy and anonymous in the web and prefer social media platforms without identification of personality. At the same time Millennials are more likely to leave permanent records to come back to them in some time.
Cultural diversity – multiculturalism is a definition of who Generation Z is. They are born in the era when attitudes on social issues are raised, when the same sex marriages and a black president is a given. They expect the continued social progress to reflect the ethnic diversity what is connected to their entire live.
Pragmatism – comparing to millennial, post-Millennial try to stay away from risk behaviour, eager to find sensible career and be confident in future. It can be due growing up in the uncertain world with loads of social and political issues (Scott, 2016).
Less focused – attention spans of post-Millennials are significantly lower (eight-second) due to constant updates in apps or social networks. They process information faster than Millennial.
Better multi-taskers – all tasks Gen Z accomplish online with the usage of different gadgets at the same time. It is not a problem to work at the busy place as they are not distracted by noise. To get several tasks done at the same moment is not a problem. This can reshape the approach to working in the office in the future.
Bargains – Millennial grew up in the age of recession so they care more about the prices than Gen Z. Saving money through the coupons and checking the prices online before purchasing is more about Millennial than Gen Z – 67% and 46%; 71% and 59% accordingly.
Higher expectations – Gen Z is born during the age of inspiring innovations and a world of technologies so it is perceived as a given. They need to achieve success in the certain amount of time based in their predictions. If they don’t, they believe something is wrong and move further. Being loyal to the business is not about them.
Big of individuality – Gen Z are born social and have higher influence by celebrities and world of fashion through social media. 92% of them have a digital footprint.
More global – the post-millennial are perceived as the first ‘global’ generation raised with the development of internet. They interact globally more than within their own country. Gen Z suffer 25% more likely with digital devices addiction than Millennial (Beall, 2016).
How to develop the next generation of managers in your organisation?
The main issue of the next generation managers that they want promotion, but are not willing to accomplish additional tasks in their new positions. There is no possibility that, for example, senior engineering can in a blink of eye become a leader for his or her team. There is gap of leadership and not every specialist is suitable for the role of leader. The opportunity to put a leader without, for example, engineering skills to lead an engineering group will not lead to success in the end of the day. The development of the next generation of managers in the organisation is one of the opportunities to solve this problem and to develop efficient leaders for the organisation. There are different ways to identify and build new leaders from the technical talents. It will be discussed below.
Picture 3 (Kineo, 2017)
Firstly, it should be explained that the role of leader requires huge responsibility. This position is not giving the leader an opportunity to act rude or mean towards his or her teammates. Secondly, the duties and responsibilities of a leader have to be highlighted and discussed before the start. Management and leadership role requires not only high amount of paper work to be done. The created by organisation operating procedures for managing have to be explained and taught to all potential leaders in details. The expectation towards each employee have to be mentioned and discussed too. This will be achieved through following up, tracking performance and holding people accountable. Another step is formally deputizing the employee to the leadership role. The whole team has to take into the account the new person’s authority and understand the standard operating procedures for management that you have asked the new leader to follow. After the leader, will get to accomplish his or her duties, the progress has to be checked regularly. It can be made through discussing the standard operating procedures on the daily basis, analyzing the management challenges which leader has faced, meeting up with team members to build up a great leader, etc. You need to make sure to take every opportunity to help the new leader define and improve his or her management techniques and approaches. And lastly, the evaluation has to be made. If there is enough guiding and support, the leader would have high commitment to the work and become successful in the new role (Tulgan, 2016).
Another approach to develop the next generation of managers is to standardize the management in the organization. These will make the task of leading the team and the organization for new managers easier as they have examples of consistent practices within the company. Another advantage is the faster communication within the organization as if the management patterns in handling different situations and communicating within the company are similar, you would be more confident in when and what results you achieve. The coaching and communication will be made much easier too when the organization has the shared language which follows upon standards.
The standardization of the management can be achieved through several ways. The managers have to be taught to handle tough situations. Large companies usually have seminars several times per year managers to understand how to do things right. Poor decisions in the long-term might lead to damage on relationship within the team and failure in the operations of the entire organization. Leaders have to understand the value of focus. Investing time in planning and seizing the opportunities will give the long-term dividends back. Everybody has to remember that irrespective of the position in the company every manager can make an impact. They have to believe in their influence and importance. By this, managers can make change not only within the team but within the organisation too (Lighthouse, 2017).
How the next generation can change workplace?
The new generation of managers are not only becoming the leading workforce nowadays, but taking their characteristics and vision of future into the organisations. These leads to changes and creating new approaches to and perceptions of working. The changes that the new generation of managers can make in the workplace will be discussed below.
The desire to shape the organisation for which the new generation of managers work is one of the biggest desires. As it was already mentioned, they need to feel that their role is strongly connected with social benefits and that they can make a change not only in the company but in the society, too. The propositions of the job that the organisation needs to address towards potential employees have to be shaped in the bigger picture of advantages where they can contribute.
The inspiration is another important point for the new generation of managers. This can be achieved through close relationship with a leader. They are looking for the leader who is communicative and being able to share mission and vision and values that go along with employee’s vision. The key traits that new generation looks for in the leader are honesty, communication, approachability, confidence and the willingness to be supportive.
Co-working and working in teams is a pattern which Generations Y and Z identified as the most important attribute in the workplace. It is very important idea that they want to work with people who can teach them something. As managers they want their opinion to be respected. Another pattern is that roughly half of managers prefer to work individually and receive the feedback on their work on the daily basis through the social network as Twitter. This can exclude the need of annual work assessment in the future.
The workplace flexibility is very important to next gen managers. It is important even more than healthcare coverage. Younger generation is more interested in accumulating their work experience today rather than planning their future career. The new generation has eight-second attention span within which they communicate, show and receive value. This can change the way of getting the work done dramatically in the future.
The technology is a key because the most of the younger generation are interested in IT and technologies today. This is obvious because they grew up in the digital age. This trend forces organisations to change their workplace to become more flexible and digitally-friendly for the new generation of employees. The social network, big variety of apps, different softwares became the core needs for the next generation. It enables them to work as efficient as they can. They brought the ideas of working remotely and telecommute to the workforce, and they are going to continue bringing new ideas to the world (Strauss, 2016).
Deloitte Next Generation Workplace Case Study
Deloitte as a huge multinational organisation believes that 21st century changed not only the society and the world we live in but the way we work, the way we manage, where we work, how we organize, the products we use, and how we communicate. All these changes impact hugely on our lives so the structure of organization and obviously of the workplace have to be changed. Deloitte conducted the survey in 2016 and found out that surveyed leaders do see the future of work and workplaces as a crucially important topic and are aware that new technologies will lead to changes in how work gets done as well as to their roles as leaders.
Several lessons were learned through this survey: 1) culture is critical, the organization has to ensure that leaders actively participate in its development; 2) companies need to look forward to being more transparent in communication and new systems, to redevelop the corporate culture around digital in the workplace, or there are big risks to decrease productivity and loose not only employees but the customers too; and 3) companies need to focus on creation of interesting and purposeful work, building the flexibility in the workplace and enabling employees to collaborate and exchange ideas transparently (Deloitte, 2017).
The workplace for the next generation workforce is developed basing on four primary workspaces: 1) social areas for face-to-face connections; 2) tech-enabled teaming areas to host a wide variety of work sessions; 3) privacy areas to support discrete conversations and 4) quite areas with individual seating for focused work (Deloitte US, 2014). It is believed that this type of workplace is highly suitable for Y and Z Generations.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the next generation of managers is new as these younger generations of employees and managers make change in the workplace, in the organisation where they work, in the society and in the world, every day. These people are next generation that contribute new ideas and approaches to develop and improve the world we live in today. They believe that their role has an impact on the society and they desire to make a change.
It is a trend as there is no way to avoid changes today. Managers, leaders, organisations, etc. have to adapt to the new digital age we live in. Without keeping up with the times no improvements can be made. It is a trend as every effective leader with an interest follows up on the changes and implement them in his or her organisation.
The management practices changed much comparing to the previous century. It is not stable yet as the more younger employees are coming to the organisation – more management techniques and approaches are developed.
The next generation of managers is obviously a new trend in management which changes constantly and has not yet been studied well enough. This means that limitations can be applied to this wiki as Generations Y and Z do not have a single definition or characteristics.
Table of Contents
The next society
The world had changed much in 2000s as new generation, new approaches and new vision came into the force. It was about the change in the society rather in economics. In the developed countries, the dominant factor was growth in older population and shrink of younger generation as the birth rate had decreased. This led the mass market to become more middle-age-determined than young-determined. New employment patterns were created because it is important to attract growing age population.The next society is knowledge society. The knowledge workers are dominant workforce comparing to 20th century society where dominant workforce was unskilled manual workers who gained experience through apprenticeships. The knowledge society is highly competitive one as informative technologies make knowledge accessible to everyone. The knowledge society member cannot get into the job through apprenticeship as it requires formal education for being suitable for the role.
In 20th century multinational companies were domestic firms with subsidiaries abroad. Each of them was self-contained, in charge of their defined territory and highly autonomous. Now multinationals are being organized globally across product and service lines. Also, another difference is that in 20th century multinational companies were controlled by ownership and now by strategy. The type of top management changed too. Before in the most large and complex companies top management was seen as an extension of operating management. Today top management has more tasks to accomplish, for example, to balance the conflicting demands on business being made by the need for both short-term and long-term results, and by the corporation's various constituencies: customers, shareholders, etc. (Drucker, 2001).
The generation gap
It has to be mentioned that Generations Y and Z have many similarities as both of them were born in the midst of technological era. Both generations connect their work with social impact and are ready to use creative tools to make change (Scott, 2016). So, Generations Y and Z will be seen as “next generation”. The differences will be discussed in next paragraph.The generation gap is an issue today as difference in approach towards different age group is massive. Another problem is in perception and understanding each other among different age groups. Baby-boomers (1946 – mid-1960s) are not very happy with volunteering or usage of technologies, when Generation X and next generation are concerned with social impact which is connected to their job. The social network among employees is one of the core needs for next generation as it increases efficiency of the work. Younger generation want to work in company that offers challenging work, sense of purpose and development. Baby-boomers and Generation X will definitely find mentoring rewarding as next generation constantly seeks feedback (Economist, 2013).
Characteristics of the next generation of managers
The next generation are quick learners and are promoted into management roles faster than other generations. For example, the Ernst and Young survey found out that 87% of next generation managers took formal leadership role in the last five years, comparing to 38% and 19% of Generation X and Baby-Boomers accordingly. They are seen as the best inclusive leaders who effectively inspire diverse group of people. That skill is highly relevant in the near future (Edmonds, 2013).There are many shared similarities between Generations Y and Z. However, there are key distinctions too. They will be discussed below.
Key distinctions between Gen Y and Z
Technology – post-Millennial do not know the world without smartphones and social network. It can be stated that they are more integrated into digital age than Millennials. The quick search and access to any information in an eye blink is another distinction of Gen Z. Millennials need some time to accomplish the same tasks.Privacy – Gen Z is more concerned about privacy and anonymous in the web and prefer social media platforms without identification of personality. At the same time Millennials are more likely to leave permanent records to come back to them in some time.
Cultural diversity – multiculturalism is a definition of who Generation Z is. They are born in the era when attitudes on social issues are raised, when the same sex marriages and a black president is a given. They expect the continued social progress to reflect the ethnic diversity what is connected to their entire live.
Pragmatism – comparing to millennial, post-Millennial try to stay away from risk behaviour, eager to find sensible career and be confident in future. It can be due growing up in the uncertain world with loads of social and political issues (Scott, 2016).
Less focused – attention spans of post-Millennials are significantly lower (eight-second) due to constant updates in apps or social networks. They process information faster than Millennial.
Better multi-taskers – all tasks Gen Z accomplish online with the usage of different gadgets at the same time. It is not a problem to work at the busy place as they are not distracted by noise. To get several tasks done at the same moment is not a problem. This can reshape the approach to working in the office in the future.
Bargains – Millennial grew up in the age of recession so they care more about the prices than Gen Z. Saving money through the coupons and checking the prices online before purchasing is more about Millennial than Gen Z – 67% and 46%; 71% and 59% accordingly.
Higher expectations – Gen Z is born during the age of inspiring innovations and a world of technologies so it is perceived as a given. They need to achieve success in the certain amount of time based in their predictions. If they don’t, they believe something is wrong and move further. Being loyal to the business is not about them.
Big of individuality – Gen Z are born social and have higher influence by celebrities and world of fashion through social media. 92% of them have a digital footprint.
More global – the post-millennial are perceived as the first ‘global’ generation raised with the development of internet. They interact globally more than within their own country. Gen Z suffer 25% more likely with digital devices addiction than Millennial (Beall, 2016).
How to develop the next generation of managers in your organisation?
The main issue of the next generation managers that they want promotion, but are not willing to accomplish additional tasks in their new positions. There is no possibility that, for example, senior engineering can in a blink of eye become a leader for his or her team. There is gap of leadership and not every specialist is suitable for the role of leader. The opportunity to put a leader without, for example, engineering skills to lead an engineering group will not lead to success in the end of the day. The development of the next generation of managers in the organisation is one of the opportunities to solve this problem and to develop efficient leaders for the organisation. There are different ways to identify and build new leaders from the technical talents. It will be discussed below.Firstly, it should be explained that the role of leader requires huge responsibility. This position is not giving the leader an opportunity to act rude or mean towards his or her teammates. Secondly, the duties and responsibilities of a leader have to be highlighted and discussed before the start. Management and leadership role requires not only high amount of paper work to be done. The created by organisation operating procedures for managing have to be explained and taught to all potential leaders in details. The expectation towards each employee have to be mentioned and discussed too. This will be achieved through following up, tracking performance and holding people accountable. Another step is formally deputizing the employee to the leadership role. The whole team has to take into the account the new person’s authority and understand the standard operating procedures for management that you have asked the new leader to follow. After the leader, will get to accomplish his or her duties, the progress has to be checked regularly. It can be made through discussing the standard operating procedures on the daily basis, analyzing the management challenges which leader has faced, meeting up with team members to build up a great leader, etc. You need to make sure to take every opportunity to help the new leader define and improve his or her management techniques and approaches. And lastly, the evaluation has to be made. If there is enough guiding and support, the leader would have high commitment to the work and become successful in the new role (Tulgan, 2016).
Another approach to develop the next generation of managers is to standardize the management in the organization. These will make the task of leading the team and the organization for new managers easier as they have examples of consistent practices within the company. Another advantage is the faster communication within the organization as if the management patterns in handling different situations and communicating within the company are similar, you would be more confident in when and what results you achieve. The coaching and communication will be made much easier too when the organization has the shared language which follows upon standards.
The standardization of the management can be achieved through several ways. The managers have to be taught to handle tough situations. Large companies usually have seminars several times per year managers to understand how to do things right. Poor decisions in the long-term might lead to damage on relationship within the team and failure in the operations of the entire organization. Leaders have to understand the value of focus. Investing time in planning and seizing the opportunities will give the long-term dividends back. Everybody has to remember that irrespective of the position in the company every manager can make an impact. They have to believe in their influence and importance. By this, managers can make change not only within the team but within the organisation too (Lighthouse, 2017).
How the next generation can change workplace?
The new generation of managers are not only becoming the leading workforce nowadays, but taking their characteristics and vision of future into the organisations. These leads to changes and creating new approaches to and perceptions of working. The changes that the new generation of managers can make in the workplace will be discussed below.The desire to shape the organisation for which the new generation of managers work is one of the biggest desires. As it was already mentioned, they need to feel that their role is strongly connected with social benefits and that they can make a change not only in the company but in the society, too. The propositions of the job that the organisation needs to address towards potential employees have to be shaped in the bigger picture of advantages where they can contribute.
The inspiration is another important point for the new generation of managers. This can be achieved through close relationship with a leader. They are looking for the leader who is communicative and being able to share mission and vision and values that go along with employee’s vision. The key traits that new generation looks for in the leader are honesty, communication, approachability, confidence and the willingness to be supportive.
Co-working and working in teams is a pattern which Generations Y and Z identified as the most important attribute in the workplace. It is very important idea that they want to work with people who can teach them something. As managers they want their opinion to be respected. Another pattern is that roughly half of managers prefer to work individually and receive the feedback on their work on the daily basis through the social network as Twitter. This can exclude the need of annual work assessment in the future.
The workplace flexibility is very important to next gen managers. It is important even more than healthcare coverage. Younger generation is more interested in accumulating their work experience today rather than planning their future career. The new generation has eight-second attention span within which they communicate, show and receive value. This can change the way of getting the work done dramatically in the future.
The technology is a key because the most of the younger generation are interested in IT and technologies today. This is obvious because they grew up in the digital age. This trend forces organisations to change their workplace to become more flexible and digitally-friendly for the new generation of employees. The social network, big variety of apps, different softwares became the core needs for the next generation. It enables them to work as efficient as they can. They brought the ideas of working remotely and telecommute to the workforce, and they are going to continue bringing new ideas to the world (Strauss, 2016).
Deloitte Next Generation Workplace Case Study
Deloitte as a huge multinational organisation believes that 21st century changed not only the society and the world we live in but the way we work, the way we manage, where we work, how we organize, the products we use, and how we communicate. All these changes impact hugely on our lives so the structure of organization and obviously of the workplace have to be changed. Deloitte conducted the survey in 2016 and found out that surveyed leaders do see the future of work and workplaces as a crucially important topic and are aware that new technologies will lead to changes in how work gets done as well as to their roles as leaders.Several lessons were learned through this survey: 1) culture is critical, the organization has to ensure that leaders actively participate in its development; 2) companies need to look forward to being more transparent in communication and new systems, to redevelop the corporate culture around digital in the workplace, or there are big risks to decrease productivity and loose not only employees but the customers too; and 3) companies need to focus on creation of interesting and purposeful work, building the flexibility in the workplace and enabling employees to collaborate and exchange ideas transparently (Deloitte, 2017).
The workplace for the next generation workforce is developed basing on four primary workspaces: 1) social areas for face-to-face connections; 2) tech-enabled teaming areas to host a wide variety of work sessions; 3) privacy areas to support discrete conversations and 4) quite areas with individual seating for focused work (Deloitte US, 2014). It is believed that this type of workplace is highly suitable for Y and Z Generations.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the next generation of managers is new as these younger generations of employees and managers make change in the workplace, in the organisation where they work, in the society and in the world, every day. These people are next generation that contribute new ideas and approaches to develop and improve the world we live in today. They believe that their role has an impact on the society and they desire to make a change.It is a trend as there is no way to avoid changes today. Managers, leaders, organisations, etc. have to adapt to the new digital age we live in. Without keeping up with the times no improvements can be made. It is a trend as every effective leader with an interest follows up on the changes and implement them in his or her organisation.
The management practices changed much comparing to the previous century. It is not stable yet as the more younger employees are coming to the organisation – more management techniques and approaches are developed.
The next generation of managers is obviously a new trend in management which changes constantly and has not yet been studied well enough. This means that limitations can be applied to this wiki as Generations Y and Z do not have a single definition or characteristics.
References
Beall, G. (2016) 8 Key Differences between Gen Z and Millennials[Online] Available from: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-beall/8-key-differences-between_b_12814200.html [Accessed 1 February 2017].
Deloitte (2017) Transitioning to the future of work and the workplace[Online] Available from: https://www2.deloitte.com/global/en/pages/human-capital/articles/gx-transitioning-to-the-future-of-work-and-the-workplace.html [Accessed 3 February 2017].
Deloitte US (2014) Next generation workplace evolution[Online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KyieSJ8wRc [Accessed 3 February 2017].
Drucker, P. (2001) The next society [Online] Available from: http://www.economist.com/node/770819 [Accessed 3 February 2017].
Economist (2013) Winning the generation game [Online] Available from: http://www.economist.com/news/business/21586831-businesses-are-worrying-about-how-manage-different-age-groups-widely-different [Accessed 31 January 2017].
Edmonds, C. (2013) Insights on next generation managers [Online] Available from: http://www.smartbrief.com/original/2013/09/insights-next-generation-managers [Accessed 31 January 2017].
Kineo (2017) Millennials into Managers: 5 Steps to Building the Next Generation of Leaders[Online] Available from: http://resources.kineo.com/5-steps-to-building-next-generation-leaders [Accessed 27 January 2017].
Lighthouse (2017) How to Develop the Next Generation of Leaders in Your Organization[Online] Available from: https://getlighthouse.com/blog/standardize-management/ [Accessed 4 February 2017].
Scott, R. (2016) Get ready for generation Z [Online] Available from: http://www.forbes.com/sites/causeintegration/2016/11/28/get-ready-for-generation-z/#79e5fd41dfed [Accessed 1 February 2017].
Strauss, K. (2016) How Your Millennial And Gen Z Employees Are Changing Your Workplace[Online] Available from: http://www.forbes.com/sites/karstenstrauss/2016/09/13/how-your-millennial-and-gen-z-employees-are-changing-your-workplace/2/#55736a6b1d69 [Accessed 5 February 2017].
Tulgan, B. (2016) Building the Next Generation of Leaders: Five Tips for Turning Top Talent into Managers [Online] Available from: https://gigaom.com/2016/08/09/building-the-next-generation-of-leaders-five-tips-for-turning-top-talent-into-managers/ [Accessed 27 January 2017].
Williams, A. (2015) Move over, Millennials, Here comes Generation Z [Online] Available from:
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/20/fashion/move-over-millennials-here-comes-generation-z.html?_r=0
[Accessed 29 January 2017].